Movement to help parents shield kids from harmful websites spreading

By Yugo Hirano

MAEBASHI —

A movement to train parents to become more savvy in the use of the Internet to protect their children from exposure to harmful websites is spreading in Japan following enactment of a new law this summer.

In June the Diet passed a bill aimed at controlling websites considered harmful to children and obliging Internet providers and cell phone operators to offer filtering services to prevent those under the age of 18 from browsing such websites.

But some say there are limitations to the law as it may fail to cover all such sites deemed harmful to minors.

The Association of Media Studies, a nonprofit organization in Maebashi, Gunma Prefecture, is actively promoting the training of mothers and fathers in what it describes as ‘‘cell phone literacy’’—the ability to recognize problems associated with the use of cell phones in accessing the Net and to be able to use such phones.

The Ibaraki and Tottori prefectural governments are also holding training courses in cooperation with the AMS and the Parent-Teacher Association, while in Chino, Nagano Prefecture, an executive committee involving municipal assembly members was inaugurated in February to consider such Internet problems.

In conjunction with the AMS, the Gunma prefectural government has been offering a course to train ‘‘child-safe Internet instructors’’ since fiscal 2005, with the aim of having them visit elementary and junior high schools to raise awareness and educate children about cell phone access to websites.

So far, 27 people have become instructors and have organized the ‘‘action committee for a Gunma children safe network,’’ giving three or four lectures a month and holding a monthly meeting to exchange information.

One male instructor visited a primary school in Takasaki, Gunma, in late July to brief children’s parents and guardians on the Internet situation.

‘‘One young girl, who registered her name with a prize contest site, was then linked to an online dating site and charged 500,000 yen,’’ he said. He also said there were ‘‘quite a few cases of children giving out other people’s private information, such as telephone numbers, without any ill intent.’‘

Hidenori Iizuka, the 41-year-old chairman of the action committee, said, ‘‘I used to pay attention only to my child’s telephone bills but I learned that money was not the problem. It’s important to have ‘human filtering’ services by which parents or guardians can manage their children’s use of cell phones.’‘

The Gunma prefectural government has also received several inquiries from other local governments this year asking for advice on how to organize parents so that they can acquire such cell phone literary to protect their children from harmful websites.

Iizuka said his group plans to cooperate with people in other parts of the country to shield children from such websites.

AMS head Hirotsugu Shimoda, 66, warned that because children in Japan can freely use the Internet via their cell phones, ‘‘the younger the age, the greater the risk.’‘

‘‘There is no meaning to legally regulating websites regarded as harmful to children because the world is linked by the Internet,’’ he said. ‘‘If the law is randomly applied they will go underground. There’s no other way but for adults to watch over their children, while we consider a solution.’’

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5 Comments

Youdontknow at 08:59 AM JST - 26th September

‘‘One young girl, who registered her name with a prize contest site, was then linked to an online dating site and charged 500,000 yen,’’

What a complete load of crap!! There isn't a dating site in the world that charges that amount of money in the first place, plus, judging by the story, there's NO WAY IN HELL she would have a credit card at such a young age to pay for such a bill and I'm 99.9% positive she never authorised any bank transfers seeing as how she would be too young to have a bank account that would allow her to do that anyway!

Either this guy is scaremongering or someone is writing complete sensationlistic crap!
DenshaDeGO at 12:38 PM JST - 26th September

How about shutting off their cell phone internet to begin with? What do they need it for?
CavemanLawyer at 02:10 PM JST - 26th September

I think the words "potentially harmful" should be used. There is no guarantee that a visit to any particular website is going to be harmful, so it is not fair to label them as such.

Yes, I know that includes porn. But how many of you guys out there viewed porn before 18? You there with your hand up! Sorry, we are not buying it. But if true it might explain your abnormalities.
franz75 at 03:17 PM JST - 26th September

hey! have you ever heard about the small plastic plugs you insert in the electric slots to avoid kids plugin things in it? Do the same with your phone and RJ45 slots. Some people are not happy the freewill you have on internet. Censorship lobbyists are arround the corner.
rjdsr at 03:46 AM JST - 3rd October

The operators of these web sites need to be shut down and thrown in prison, now. Operators of websites who have search engines that link to this content need to be banned from Japan, now. we will no longer tolerate foreign bad morals trying to push themselves on our nation.

Get out, now! This is Japan, not the west.